


Maw

by BorderSpam



Series: Twins Prompts [6]
Category: Borderlands (Video Games)
Genre: Blood and Gore, Body Horror, Body Modification, Cults, Dismemberment, Gen, God Complex, Hallucinations, Horror, Mental Health Issues, References to Depression, Terminal Illnesses, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-17
Updated: 2020-03-17
Packaged: 2021-02-28 23:15:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,336
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23185360
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BorderSpam/pseuds/BorderSpam
Summary: Troy inspects his latest body modification prior to a planned reveal to his followers in a horrific LetsFlay, and considers how heavy the price he’s paid to change his appearance may really be. He's crafted his body into a monster, and sacrificed another fragment of his dwindling humanity to do so.Part of my Leech Lord AU series, some OC mentions. Oneshot, please note the tags for TWs.
Series: Twins Prompts [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1525211
Comments: 2
Kudos: 15
Collections: Leech Lord AU





	Maw

**Author's Note:**

> The Twins Prompts series is part of the AU I'm working on, if you enjoyed this, check out the #my hcs tag on my Tumblr for plenty for world and character building with asks and shorts - 
> 
> https://border-spam.tumblr.com/search/my%20hcs
> 
> Comments appreciated! Still very new to writing. :)

He hissed sharply inwards, then held the breath in his lungs. Futilely willing his heartbeat to calm as he began to mentally count down from 10 like the surgeon had taught him. Every session had been a little better than before, he’d get through it. Stay focused, stay calm, and count from _Ten_...

 _Nine…_ Same as he’d had to do twice a day for the last month, knuckles turning white as his grip tightened on the rim of the stone basin. _Eight_ … Same seemingly endless 10 seconds he’d endured over and over. They _would_ end, keep breathing. _Seven…_ Eyes screwed tightly closed and brow furrowed as the burning pain shot through his gums and jaw. _Six…_ Slowly exhaling through his nose as the fire traveled down his throat and into the root of his tongue. _Five…_ The surgeon had said this would take weeks, not a month. _Four_ … Lower lip trembling as the pain faded into a throb, faster than last time, good. _Three_ … He’d known it would need this care. He’d researched. He’d known. No regrets now. _Two…_ He’d just overestimated how fast he would heal, that’s all. It was major surgery. It would be worth it in the end. _One_ … It would be worth it.

It would be _worth the pain_.

Letting his head drop forward as he shuddered in a slow breath, Troy slowly opened his watery eyes and took in his reflection in the mirror he faced, softly illuminating him in the dark comfort of his ship’s washroom.

He looked haggard. Cool blue eyes bloodshot and beginning to spill over with the tears he’d held back as the pain subsided, normally rich sepia skin faded to a sickly pallor and glistening with sweat. Some king _he_ was.

“ _F-fuck.._ ” He sputtered, watching in disgusted fascination as the antiseptic wash gushed over his lips and into the sink under him, leaving strings of blood tinged saliva trailing under his chin. Deep crimson swirls mixing through the blue medical fluid as it splashed up the sides of the basin.

The reaction to the cleaning was a little better than last time, he thought with a sigh as he turned the faucet and watched the medical fluid swirl down the drain. It _was_ healing, and he probably only had another week or so to go before it was fully functional, but shit. It hurt still. A lot.

Running a thumb gently over the swollen reddened seam in his lip, he decided to remind himself _why_ he’d done this as he stared at the dribble of fresh blood it had leaked onto his finger.

Why he’d spent months researching, contacting body mod experts, surgeons, flaunting his name and infamy to reassure them that yes, he was serious. Yes, he had given this plenty of thought. Yes, he understood how major this would be. Yes, he appreciated how much of his jaw and tongue wouldn’t actually be _him_ anymore. That things may not taste the way he remembered after. That his mouth would never be the same.

He had done it, because he didn’t _**like**_ his mouth in the first place.

It was too soft. Too big, lips too full. It smiled too wide and drew the eye to his delicate cheekbones, he was so _sick_ of being delicate. Troy had been delicate enough his entire childhood, he didn’t want to be as a man too. He wanted respect. He wanted **power**.

He’d never given it much thought before Pandora. Never really thought about how he looked _at all_. It had just never been something that required any attention. Why would either have them had even considered their appearances? How they looked had no affect on how well they scavenged, or helped his twin on the nights she was overwhelmed with the reality of her gifts, or change how Pop had acted around him..

It just had never _mattered_. They were them. They were each other. Why would they need to ever look different? How could it change anything?

He hadn’t cared till Pandora, till other people started to care. And _comment_. And they had commented plenty in those first few months he and his twin had spent trying to form what was now the planet consuming behemoth known as the Children of the Vault. Tyreen had quickly been accepted after he’d designed her imposing outfit and she’d started styling her appearance, but he hadn’t been.

The tattoos had helped for a while, the gauges and piercings he got after too, but he’d had those years now, and he still wasn’t intimidating enough. He was still pitiful. That quiet, stammering, _gut wrenchingly_ _gentle_ voice in the back of his mind reminded him of that often enough on nights when he’d be unable to sleep. When he’d lay in bed staring at the dark ceiling of his bedchamber for hours, and feel his skin crawl while he pretended he couldn’t hear the whispers.

Their rapidly growing follower count had been plenty vocal about which of the twins was the more impressive. Which of the twins they mocked more. Which of the twins had _fail collection_ echo vids of stumbling and looking sickly, and devoted fan forums offering pity and love for the clear _underling_.

He didn’t want pity. He didn’t want love. He wanted **fear** , so he changed it. He changed his face.

Troy Calypso is not Troy DeLeon. He does not make rash decisions and be hopeful for the best outcome, everything is planned, everything is schemed. A month out of public eye while he healed? That was fine. He preferred to not be in it that much recently anyway, not while he knew he looked _soft_ …

That had changed now, he reminded himself, watching as his reflection slowly split its lips into a wide, vicious grin that didn’t quite reach its exhausted eyes.

His mouth was _razor shar_ _p_ now.

As the smile melted away, he let his jaw drop open, angling his head slowly from side to side to check the alignment with his skull. Perfect, so much better now that there wasn’t any swelling. Even and balanced, with no lingering stiffness like it had in the last week. If he didn’t know better, he’d think the seams that ran along the center of his chin and the width of his cheekbones were cosmetic, and man... he couldn’t wait to show the galaxy that they _weren’t_.

Bracing himself with a deep exhale, he lifted his arms, hooked his flesh fingers and prosthetic’s metal digits over the line of teeth on either side of his lower jaw, and snarled deeply as he _pulled downwards._  
  
The sensation of this exercise had changed dramatically over the weeks. The agony of tearing apart the healing tissue had originally been so bad that the intensely powerful painkillers he’d been doped with for the first few days couldn’t mask it, but now it was more just.. strange. Like the tension of stretching a thick piece of elastic, but _inside_ him. Muscles complained as they shifted unnaturally, despite weeks of training with them daily, but it didn’t hurt anymore. It just felt intimately _wrong_. Almost arousing in a way, and he noted with an amused snort that this could be a _lot_ of fun in bed once healed up. Well, fun for _him_. Then again, he was all that ever mattered in that situation anyway. He stored it away as something else to look forward to after the reveal.  
  
Slowly easing the jaw downwards, he felt his upper lip curl into a smile as the latches on either side of his cheeks popped open, responding smoothly to the downwards movement on cue. No pain, no stiffness, an improvement at last. It really _had_ been worth doing these exercises.  
  
Tilting his head back slowly to allow the jaw to distend fully downwards, he counted to three, a deep breath through his throat for each digit, and slowly… gently… began to pull outward.   
  
The shuddering crack that ran through his jawbone as it disconnected at the front seam reverberated up though his skull just like last time he’d done this, and he winced at the sharp jolt of pain. Bad, but nothing unbearable. He’d been through _far_ worse. It still wept blood as it split apart and stretched to either side, but it was clean, and healing, and it looked monstrous.

It was _**perfect**_.

Holding each part of his split mandible outwards, he let himself relax, focusing on the muscular movement needed to force the modified tongue out from the depths of his throat and to hang beneath the open maw. This had healed really quickly, he’d been honestly surprised, but the damage in his neck had taken time. The torn and reattached muscle at the connection to his original tongue’s root in his throat still burned and ached like a healing bruise as he forced the slithering length outwards to lol between the jaws, and he slowly removed his hands from them.  
  
Keeping the jaws open like this with just muscle control had been something he’d only managed a day ago, and the difference in strength already was _incredible_. He watched the undulating waves of the extended tongue as it coiled, drool rolling down its writhing length as the mandibles above it twitched with the effort of holding them open without any support.  
  
The modified row of secondary teeth hidden inside the line of his natural jaw bone were exactly how he’d wanted them, serrated fangs pointing inwards like barbs. They knit together into a solid plate and rested under his tongue when the mandible closed, but open like this? _Beautiful_. Terrifying. His mouth looked like a weapon. It looked like he could eat you alive. Let’s see them laugh at him now, let’s see them call him soft when he could crunch their bones between his fucking _teeth_.

Troy gargled a crackling laugh over the pooling drool in his throat, smile creasing his eyes in the mirror’s reflection as the light caught his distended golden canines, inhumanly long tongue curling at the end in mirth. _This_ was his mouth now. No one else in the universe had a mouth like this, this was unique! This was -  
  
_~~“b-broken.”~~_

That voice again...

 _“… Kkrrokennn... ”_ he slurred against his palate, tongue grotesquely twitching towards his chest as it attempt to form the word.

Now _there_ was a memory he’d prefer to have not surfaced right this second, swallowing the tongue slowly back into his throat as the mandible began to close.

It had been a long time, huh. Long time since he’d first noticed. Long time since he’d last asked why… He lifted his left hand and carefully pressed the lagging right mandible upwards, feeling the click as it connected and realigned with its twin. His eyes locked on his mouth in the mirror’s reflection, and absolutely _not_ on the shape his peripheral vision insisted was standing in the darkness behind him. The one that he was aware was now speaking once more…

“ _Maybe it was j-just easier for her to not say the truth. Maybe you were less of a burden on her that way, huh. She m-must have been so tired of looking after you, Pop too. They must have been counting the minutes…_ ” He heard it whisper in the back of his mind, that sickening, gentle voice it was getting harder and harder to tune out recently.

“Shut the fuck up.” He muttered under his breath, slowly leaning over the sink and resting his elbows in the rim, watching the water spiral down into the darkness of the drain.  
  
He’d made himself.. he’d made himself even _more_ different now. Hadn’t he. Even _more_ broken. What would she think now.

He treasures the memory of Leda. He loves her completely, and he knows that’s true, because damn.. the feelings never changed. He’s never stopped. When he thinks about his mother, he feels the exact same way he did last time he saw her. He was what, 8? Yeah. They were 8 when it happened, that’s right. They were 26 now… They had decayed from children into monsters and still, the _exact_ same warmth blossoms deep in his core when he thinks of her now as it did when he was a little boy.

He feels the twinge of a smile pull at the seam on his lip as he focuses on letting his mind wander back to when he last saw her, but he wishes, in a festering way, she could see him _now_. Not because it would make her proud, no. God no. He knows she would be repulsed by what he sees in the mirror now, the thing with the metal fangs and hatred inked into its skin, but because he could show her how _broken_ he really had been. 

That he _knew all along_ when he’d asked over and over as a child. That she should have just told him and not wasted her love and care on something that would become so disgusting.

He closes his eyes, listening to the running water gargling down the echoing pipe below him, and leans heavier onto this arms. Remembering.

God. He had been _so sick_.

* * *

Day after day, unable to leave his parent’s bed, watching Tyreen’s tantrum’s towards Momma and Pop because Troy couldn’t come explore, or Troy was coughing too much, or Troy got to sleep with them when she didn’t, and it had really _hurt_ to see her sad because of him. It had been _his_ fault she was lonely.

He remembers the guilt, wanting so much to get up and go play with his sister, but not being able to stand for too long before the shakes would start, and then the seizures... Remembers being bundled up in Leda’s arms and bouncing against her hard shoulder as she ran back to their home, screaming at Typhon for letting Troy out of his sight. Troy was sick. Troy needed to rest. But he rested for so long that he forgot what it had been like before, and he _never got any better._

He remembers the endless questions, and that they never gave him real answers, even though deep down he knew it was just because he was...

_“Why do my stripes not glow, but Ty’s do, Pop?”_

_“Ty-die, how come you can make those sparks but I can’t do anything?“_

_“Momma how come everyone else has two arms and everyone else isn’t sick and I’m...“_

~~“Broken broken _broken **BROKEN** ”_~~

He remembers the gentle jostle of Leda shifting over onto the bed with him, the heat of her big strong hands against his ribs as she helped prop him up against the pillow as he weakly reached for the little wooden Knight he had left behind on Nekrotafeyo when they escaped. The one Sparrow had made for him. He remembers the frustration of not being able to hold it tightly enough to lift it, and how that seemed so very important at the time. Like it was the most unfair thing in the world. He remembers the comfort of her long fingers sweeping the hair back from his feverish forehead as he glared down at the faded wooden Knight with it’s snapped leg and peeling green paint, and the exhaustion in her voice as she wearily answered -

“Well.. not everyone is the same, Moonbright. Some people are sick sometimes, some people have shapes that might not look like other’s. Some people can sing, some people are clever, some people are kind, some people are terrible. Everyone’s _different_ , babe. ”

And he remembers how dumb that answer sounded, trying not to be angry as he frowned, rolling the little wooden Knight on his lap as he stared down at the dull red markings across the fingers that gripped its broken leg.

“Yeah but Momma.. Why am I _so_ different. ”

* * *

They never answered it. They never just said the truth. "Everyone is different" is obvious, of course he knew that. Kids aren’t stupid, and he had been a clever kid.. he had spent so many days in that bed wondering why they never just _told_ him the reason he was so.. wrong. So many more as an adult wondering why did it take 13 more years of thinking back and questioning for Tyreen to matter of factly state “...Cuz they were waiting for you to die.” while filing her nails one evening in their shared quarters.

He knows now that they did it out of love, but he also knows he harbors some deep, toxic frustration with his parents because of it. He knows they were trying to keep him happy, that they thought the truth too cruel, but… he spent so many nights sick and alone and in pain, wondering that same question over and over as a child.. and they never told him.

Ty _did_. Ty _does_. Ty knows he’s just fucking _broken_.

They had tried to lie, to keep him from the cruel reality, but it had been true, and he wishes Leda could look at him now, see him hunched over a bloody sink having defiled his face, just so that she could turn away from him in disgust. Then he could _know_ she hated him. Then he could stop holding on, just give up. Just let it go. Become this thing he’d crafted himself into, instead of holding on to dying threads of who he wished he still was inside.   
  
He lifts his hand to his face and presses his fingers into the bridge of his nose, pinching, the swirling water background noise now against the pressure inside his head.

How much of him was even left, really. How much of him was metal now, how much of him was the God King.

Years ago, when they had first arrived, Seifa had said he could become anything he wanted to make himself on Pandora, that he had a fresh start. A life. That it could be his choice, and that he had as much a say in it as Tyreen… and _look_ at what he had made himself into in the end.

Exactly what she’d _sworn_ to him that he wasn’t.

Less than 6 months since she’d dropped him like the burden he was, and he’d done this. He’d betrayed them both. Would Mom cry, or not have the tears to waste on what he’d chosen to become after everything she did to try and hide it from him.

A broken, monstrous thing.

He sighs, squinting at the faucet before reaching out and turning it off, then rubs at his eyes in the quiet of the dark washroom, smearing eyeliner further across his cheeks. He’s tired. He could have done without remembering this. It’s hard enough to sleep nowadays without getting stuck on shit like this all night. He stands slowly, stretching his back with a series of pops, and touches the tender side of his jaw gingerly. He still had a few of those painkillers, he remembers with a sniff. Couple of those should knock him out. Keep the nightmares away for one more night. He’d be making his big reveal soon anyway…   
  
With one last glance at the mirror, confirming he _was_ alone in the room, Troy turned and walked towards the door to his bedchamber. Sleep now. Emotional bullshit later. That was for tomorrow him, he’d fix it then. He could fix everything, after all. Fixing problems was his forte. He only ever needed _time_.

* * *

The LetsFlay numbers looked gooood.

 _3 billion concurrent viewers_ and rising according to the stream data flickering in the inner forearm of his prosthetic, they were hungry for this. They were hungry to see _him_ , he gloated, easily sidestepping the frantic stabbing of the heretic who’d been unfortunate enough to find themself face to face with God King Calypso in the wild melee of this raid.   
  
_3.5_ now he glimpsed, grin wide enough to strain the clips at his cheeks as his sword crunched through the man’s torso, the weight of his prosthetic arm enough to make its downwards swing render solid bone to wet fragments. They didn’t even have time to yelp. _Shame_ , that would have been great for the fans watching from home.   
  
He’d planned ahead to get the hype built around this specific raid, his media team working around the clock to spread articles and social updates that the King would be making an appearance, the first in the public’s eye in 2 months, and that he had a fun s _urprise_ to unveil for his followers. That he would be leading this raid, just him, all him. No Tyreen. She wasn’t _needed_ this time. 

The chaos around him is deafening, screeches shrieking over gunfire as COV marauders scream litanies to the Twin Gods while tearing the camp and its inhabitants apart. Heretics, _idiots_ , they brought this on _themselves_. They should have taken the offer, joined the Children of the Vault when approached, not attacked a protected caravan in response. He laughs viciously over the raucous, grabbing a panicked bandit who’d dropped to their knees to beg for mercy in front of him, stuttering that they were a _true believer_ as his retinue of crusaders slaughtered other heretics around them.  
  
_Bullshit_. Now they were just fodder, fuel for the media machine, playthings to tear apart on livestream and rile up the followers, get those sweet donations coming in, and mannn were those donations coming in, he noted with a chuckle, barely registering the wet popping of the man’s ribs puncturing his lungs as he ground him into the dirt with the monstrous robotic fist.

This was a _great_ score. This was a _game now,_ and he wished she could see him, blood spattering over his bare, toned torso as he marched onwards, pausing only to rip another piece of screeching meat in two, or sink metal teeth into a limb and tear it from its joint, and each new kill made the score go up:

\---  
_4 billion viewers.  
__\---_

His eyes burn with laughter as he crushes another throat, skin flushed and breathing heavy.

\---  
_4.5 billion viewers.  
__\---_

He sensually smears the blood dripping from his gilded mouth over his chest and abdomen with a obscene caress of his hand, maintaining eye contact with the floating cam circling him as he sneers, the adoration of billions of rabid followers flowing back through the flashing lens.

\---  
_5.5 billion viewers._

 _25 billion dollars in donations and it was all for HIM, for God King Calypso.  
_ _\---_

He wi _s_ hed Leda could see him now. 

She can’t, but if she could, she’d really _see_. She’d know what he was all along. That she’d been wrong, and she should had killed him when she had the chance. Then he wouldn’t be here now, doing _this_ to these filth.

His heart is pounding and he can’t fill his lungs quick enough, the insanity of the camp being slaughtered around him is just a blur of viscera and violence. It’s a bloodthirsty high he’s not felt in years and he’s lost to it, the carnal pulse of snapping bone and screaming faces, he’s invincible. He’s immortal, a God tearing through paper thin flesh as it laughs through bloodstained fangs.   
  
He’s _Troy Calypso_ , _Twin God_ , _God **King**_ , he’s perf-   
  
Breath rushes out of his chest in a forced bellow as fire erupts through his ribs, and _everything stops_.

No sound, no movement. Just a heretic to his left, a crude bayonet, and a _lucky_ stab. His retinue guard missed the open flank. A crusader is screaming his name but it’s not reaching him, he can’t hear them now. All he can see is this disgusting, meaningless, mortal _thing_ staring into the eyes of a God, and the raw terror in their gaze as they realise they’ve missed anything vital. They whisper something, perhaps an apology, but it’s too late.

In one fluid motion, Troy’s maw splits and engulfs their entire head as he whips to the side.

There is a single second that feels like an infinity as the entire camp seems to draw in a silent breath, as every marauder, every crusader, every piece of bandit scum looks on in silent, horrified awe. Billions of eyes across the echonet watch in shock in that moment that seems to last an eternity. Watch as he feels the man’s muffled scream start against his tongue, as the serrated fangs lock into his flesh, watch as with a guttural roar, Troy bites down…

… and the heretic’s skull is crushed in his jaws.

Bone shards and pulped brain matter burst between the mandibles in a spray of gore, and the bloodcurdling screech that rises up from the followers throughout the camp is like nothing he has ever heard. It’s like a _dream_.

It’s a swelling hymn from the mouths of hundreds, all to him, to his glory. They shriek his name in a fervent prayer to their hallowed God King, and he closes his eyes as the chanting swells to a cacophony around him, blood streaming down his chest as he lets the mangled body drop from his hanging maw to the ground.

The hysterical screaming rises to fever pitch, and he stands, unmoving. Their _God_. Eyes closed and arms held open in triumphant welcome as the deafening noise engulfs him, heart pounding through frantic ecstasy as viscera drops from his twitching jaws.

A towering monster standing amongst the corpses of insects.

He glances down, panting, at his stream data. Letting his mind focus on the blinking panel as he _yanks_ the bloody bayonet from his heaving ribs with a grunt.

\---  
_8.5 billion live viewers._

_“God King Calypso” trending across all major social media._

_55 billion dollars in donations to the LetsFlay stream.  
_ _\---_

He _wishes_ she could see what he is now, so he could stop pretending to himself she’d still love him.

He just hopes the camera isn’t picking up the tears he can taste as they drip from his cheeks and run down his squirming tongue.


End file.
